Opinion
Papers

The so-called fortress west strategy is the translation of national conservatism into foreign policy. It rejects the post-Cold War doctrine of liberal hegemony, which viewed the Alliance as a vehicle for spreading democracy in favour of strategic solvency. This shift was predicted and shaped by the new right intellectuals between 2023 and 2025. Sumantra Maitra, who coined the term “dormant NATO” at the Centre for Renewing America, provided the strategic framework, arguing that expansion had reached a point of diminishing returns and must be halted to force European burden-sharing. Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg and Fred Fleitz’s operational roadmaps at the America First Policy Institute laid the groundwork for using a hold on Ukraine’s NATO membership as a necessary diplomatic lever. Underpinning it all is the geopolitical logic of Elbridge Colby’s “Strategy of Denial”,  which posits that to compete with China in the Indo-Pacific, the United States must ruthlessly right-size its commitments in the Atlantic. The NSS merely codifies this long-held view: the alliance is an asset to be managed, not a religion to be spread.

Accepting the Revisionist Perspective while Seeking Peace

Issuing the NSS amid ongoing peace negotiations was a clear signal. Washington explicitly informed Kyiv that NATO membership is not feasible, asserting that the reality of enlargement must be averted. This move will force a shift from demands for institutional integration to a pragmatic pursuit of security assurances.

Yet, the ramifications of this change will extend much beyond the negotiating process. By freezing the enlargement, the United States has erroneously conferred upon the Kremlin a substantial historical and propaganda victory. The Russian perspective that NATO enlargement has consistently been a destabilising provocation is implicitly accepted. The idea that powerful countries have the right to reject the security decisions of their smaller neighbours is reincarnated.

When examined through the lens of history, this compromise is profoundly detrimental. In his study, “The Myth of a No-NATO-Enlargement Pledge to Russia”, renowned scholar of the Cold War Mark Kramer illustrated that the assertion the West assured Mikhail Gorbachev “not one inch eastward” was a lie. Kramer meticulously utilised declassified archives to prove that no such binding pledge was ever made in 1990; the “betrayal” was a myth constructed by Russians to justify revisionism. The 2025 Strategy tragically turns this myth into reality. The US, by unilaterally freezing NATO enlargement, is retrospectively indirectly legitimising the erroneous justification used to rationalise the 2008 invasion of Georgia and the ensuing military aggression against Ukraine.

Nonetheless, it is imperative to acknowledge that this strategic shrinking does not imply total forsaking. Washington is dedicated to fostering a just and lasting peace for Ukraine. The so-called porcupine strategy, integral to the fortress west philosophy, emphasises significant militarisation to ensure Ukraine’s sovereignty and defence, irrespective of the Article 5 guarantee.

The Treaty in Limbo

This policy precipitates an institutional crisis for the Alliance itself, centred on the Washington Treaty of 1949. Article 10, which invites any European state capable of “contributing to the security of the North Atlantic area” to join, has never been amended. Moreover, there is almost zero probability for an agreement among the 32 member states to modify it at this time.

This creates a diplomatic conundrum where the door remains legally open but politically welded shut by the American “veto”. NATO would be operating as a walled-in community: highly concentrated on those inside, but detached from those locked out. The Alliance will be forced to reinvent its relationship with aspirants, most probably focusing on capability partnerships. These mechanisms could provide training, intelligence, and armaments to some extent while explicitly eliminating the political assurance of future defence.

Georgia’s Dilemma: Reshaping Aspirations vs. The Propaganda Trap

For Georgia, the Bucharest promise that membership is inevitable, is at stake. The ambiguity that once safeguarded aspirants has been replaced by the certainty of a major policy change. However, to interpret this as a signal to abandon Euro-Atlantic integration would be a fatal mistake.

Georgia must reshape, not abandon, its integration strategy through coherent and mutually beneficial dialogue with Alliance. Crucially, Georgia should be pursuing to preserve existing integration mechanisms and the cooperation level to remain a valuable operational partner for NATO. The Substantial NATO-Georgia Package (SNGP) is important not for the sake of political optics, but for maintaining interoperability and continued development in defence and security sphere. The ability of the Georgian Defence Forces to operate according to NATO standards is existential for the country’s security and resilience; losing this interoperability would degrade Georgia’s military capability back to Soviet standards, making it vulnerable to both conventional and hybrid threats.

However, a crucial question persists: does the current Georgian authorities have the credibility to implement this transition securing Georgia’s place on the right side? Navigating and successfully manoeuvring through the Fortress West reality requires a government that is trusted in Washington, as well as in Europe, as a reliable partner. Yet, the current authorities have spent significant political capital on a blaming and shaming campaign against Western partners, attacking the very institutions that underpin Georgia’s security framework. Surely, one cannot solicit Western support while simultaneously demonising the West.

The Ultimate Danger: Weaponising the Abandonment

The most significant risk lies not alone in the US policy itself, but in its potential domestic manipulation in Georgia. The present authorities and their propaganda apparatus are likely to exploit the NATO enlargement freeze to justify their anti-Western rhetoric. They will probably present this as evidence that “the West never desired us”, contending that the years devoted to Euro-Atlantic integration were futile and that the West “exploited” Georgia.

This narrative serves a singular, dangerous purpose: to justify an eventual, irreversible abandonment of the country’s Euro-Atlantic path. By claiming that the door is shut by Washington, Tbilisi may seek to legitimise a pivot toward Moscow or other authoritarian poles, dismantling the integration framework established over decades. The scenario where Georgia drifts into the Russian orbit in the spirit of calculated “pragmatism”, would serve Russia’s interests far more effectively than any military invasion. Should the Georgian authorities exploit the US strategic realignment to completely dismantle the Euro-Atlantic integration, they would have accomplished what Russian tanks initiated in 2008.

Conclusion: The Unchanging Nature of Change

Ultimately, the fortress west approach is a significant American Grand Strategy transaction. The United States is trading the aspirational ideal of a Europe whole and free for a strictly pragmatic strategic assessment. Washington is adopting a more limited, sustainable, and risk-averse view of its obligations in Europe. If today’s strategic pause turns into a lasting freeze, a new status quo will characterise the continent for decades to come.

The Alliance will recognise in reality that the enlargement era is finished as long as the United States declares so, but most likely keep the rhetoric of the “Open Door” on life support to avoid the complexity of treaty change or the launch of a strategic reflection process. As the Alliance moves toward the present, its centre of gravity will move away from the future map. Instead of focusing on the appearance of an ever-expanding Alliance, the real battles in Brussels will be about burden-sharing, capability targets, and the existential question of whether Europe can create a credible conventional deterrence against Russia with a fixed 32-member Alliance.

For nations like Georgia, caught in the undertow of this shift, the challenge is stark. The danger is that while the West retreats to its fortress, the vulnerable frontier is left not just exposed, but politically adrift, tempted by cynical leaders to mistake the end of enlargement for the end of the West itself.

December 2025